When was the last time that anyone saw one thousand students taking over the streets of Cambridge? Or scaling fences to run triumphantly across the forbidden space of Senate House lawn? Or march with determination towards the closed doors of the building where the decisions are being made about our future – only to be confronted by police deploying their batons indiscriminately?

The London protests on 10 November heralded the beginning of a far wider student movement that took action against cuts and fees on Wednesday. From Plymouth to Glasgow, London to Nottingham, students marched, occupied and blockaded.

One thousand protesters marched through Cambridge town centre with sound-systems, banners and a beautiful array of hand-made placards. This included schoolchildren who will not be able to afford to go to university, sixth-formers whose EMA is being cut, university students facing a declining quality of education and limited job prospects, teachers and lecturers who are threatened with job losses, parents who demand that their children are offered opportunities, not closed doors.

This was a truly diverse crowd, giving meaning to Cameron’s flaccid conceit of a ‘big society’: we really are all in this together.

The march culminated at the Old Schools and Senate House, where hundreds of people made a decision to breach the fence and occupy the lawn. These buildings are the nerve-centre of the University from which an internal statement was circulated stating that ‘the University welcomes the potential flexibility offered by the Government’s decision to increase the maximum annual tuition fee to 9k’. This will make an already exclusive university even more elitist, shutting ordinary people out of educational opportunity.

The protesters reclaimed a space from which they are formally excluded, where decisions were being made to limit educational opportunity for all. They used it to make collective decisions together about their future and agreed to issue a statement demanding ‘that the University completely oppose all cuts to education, and to use its influence to oppose the spending review’s threat to education, welfare, health, and other public services.’

Even though this was a student protest, the protesters actively reached beyond the realm of education, standing side-by-side with everyone affected by public sector cuts. It takes a certain bravery to step beyond the comfort of single issue campaigning and step up to becoming part of a broader movement. Cambridge took that step yesterday.

The energy and drive to action of Wednesday’s protests were borne of the anger people across the country feel at the betrayal of the Lib Dems, the hypocrisy of Labour and the ruthlessness of the Tories.

Cambridge students were further betrayed by the University’s decision to invite baton-wielding police officers onto the lawn, where they attacked students. This head-on collision with the brutal duplicity of so-called leaders is symptomatic of the inability of the current political establishment to act in the interests of the people they claim to represent.

Like so many other historical political movements, we are being forced to recognise that inaction is no longer an option and we must use our voices, our bodies and our minds to resist.